Raising Your Rates: Making Your Services more valuable and desirable

If you are a freelancer like me, charging the best rate for your work is probably very difficult. When I started to work as a Spanish tutor, my rate was the minimum, because I honestly compared myself with other freelancers who offered low rates for their job. 

I also had no experience and was working in a profession with no certificate or degree. So, I started to suffer from something called impostor syndrome, which had a big impact on my rate because it made me doubt myself as a language trainer. What’s more, I used to work long hours planning classes for my students, trying to figure out what they needed, and after all that, I only charged the minimum rate.

This situation changed over time because I have gotten enough experience teaching children, adolescents, and adults since I started in 2022. Nowadays, I feel more confident teaching and blessed because, in this profession, you get to know interesting people, practice your target language, learn about your mother tongue, and start feeling comfortable speaking in front of the camera. So, if you want to get out of your box, I recommend you be a language trainer. 

I have also made many resources like presentations, games, practices, links, and worksheets for people who study Spanish as a second language during the past 2 years. So I decided to make a Google Site to share these resources and named it Españoamigos to start my business’s first brand. My clients and I were both impressed with the results. I recommend you share some of your teaching or translating resources to let people know your experience and passion for the profession.

At the beginning of this year, I looked at myself as full of experience, confidence, and resources, which encouraged me to raise my rates for my current and new clients. In the past months, I have met incredible clients who have decided to pay me the new rates.  Even though they were attending classes occasionally, I could see how my revenue increased a lot. Today, I look back and am undoubtedly glad I made those changes. 

Nowadays, my clientele pays me my current rates and attends my classes frequently. On one hand, I could say that higher prices made my services more valuable and desirable. On the other hand, I hope that my experience encourages you to charge more, even if you lose opportunities when you start to do it, because there are many other clients who will recognize the value of your work.